Sunday, August 07, 2011

Ronald Reagan Trail: Conclusion

Another Marathon Pundit travel series is "in the books." Speaking of books, my goal is to write a book about Ronald Reagan Trail. If you know any agents or publishers, please put them in touch with me. Obviously more work needs to be done, such as interviews of people in each Reagan Trail town.

But in the short term, it's important for conservatives, particularly Chicago ones, to focus efforts on saving the only Chicago home of our 40th president, the apartment building at 832 E. 57th Street. Frank Grabowski, who sold the six-flat to the University of Chicago in 2004, told the Southtown Star in February that the college was aware "Dutch" lived there in 1915 but "wasn't concerned and wanted to pull it down." My idea is to turn the building into a museum dedicated to Reagan and conservative economist Milton Friedman, a U of C professor and Nobel Prize recipient. Reagan put Friedman's theories into use during his presidency.

Chicago Reagan apt., July 10

About the trip: I left Morton Grove at 4:15am on June 6 and returned home at 10:3pm that night. Yes, I did it all in one day, although I met a separate trip to the Chicago apartment, which isn't a Trail location. I recommend that anyone looking to make the RR Trail drive that you allow two days. Not all of the Reagan homes are open to the public and winter presents an additional challenge--the Tampico birthplace is open seven days a week only from April through October and on weekends in March, but I believe you can call to make an appointment to visit it at other times.

Each of the photographs in this series was taken by your humble blogger. All of them, except where noted, were captured on that hot day in June. The videos were produced by the Ronald Reagan Trail.

The towns on the Trail, need to do more to promote their place on it--Tampico and Dixon excepted. Of the other stops, only Henry displays Reagan-themed artwork--unless I missed something. Henry is one of the several Trail towns on Illinois Route 29, which doubles as the Illinois River Scenic Byway--and this part of the journey was my favorite.

Dixon has an annual Reagan Trail Days festival--which coincidentally begins Tuesday. It should be a Trail-wide celebration.

Three Illinoisans ascended directly from the Prairie State to the White House: Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, and Barack Obama. But they weren't born in Illinois--in fact, none of them step foot in the state until they were adults.

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